The Guru’s WNBA Report: Minnesota Win Streak at Eight While New York, Washington, Las Vegas, and Indiana Also Triumph

By Mel Greenberg @womhoopsgurux

The WNBA remainder of the regular season and start of the stretch drive to the playoffs after the All-Star break got underway Tuesday night with a five-game package, the favorites winning each game but all being their own adventure in terms of the differentials.

First-place Minnesota (23-6) picked up where the the Lynx left off, returning to a win streak growing to eight by winning 100-93 over expansion Toronto (10-17) in a high-scoring affair before a home crowd of 12,121 at the Target Center in Minneapolis.

Defending champion Las Vegas (19-8) took advantage of second-year Golden State (19-8) being idle and easily won 98-83 over expansion Portland (11-17) to move into second-place tie with the Valkyries three games behind the Lynx in a home win before a crowd of 10,240 at Michelob ULTRA Arena.

Indiana (18-10) tightened things on the high end of the standings a bit winning 105-95 at last place Seattle (6-24) on the play of Caitlin Clark and Kelsey Mitchell to to hold fifth over idle Atlanta (16-10) a game in front of the Dream with their fourth straight victory, moving within a half-game of idle Dallas (18-9), which is a game out of second as Storm crowd of 18,343 attended the game at the Climate Pledge Arena in Washington state.

New York (16-12) made it three-straight, all narrow encounters that could have easily made a previous situation much worse had the outcomes all reversed, by winning in the last minute 113-109 at Los Angeles (10-17) before a crowd of 15,499 at Crypto.com Arena enabling the Liberty to to hold seventh a half-game in front of Washington (15-12) and a game behind Atlanta and in reasonably in close distance of all above except Minnesota at the top.

The Sparks, off the loss, fell into a 10th-place tie with Toronto a half-game behind Portland, which is ninth 4.5 behind the eighth-place cutoff for the playoffs held by the Mystics, who at home in the nation’s capital won 92-84 before a CareFirst Arena crowd of 4,200 over the 14th-place Sun in the 15-team league contending hard to be part of the eight-team playoff field in September.

Miles Leads Lynx Over Tempo

Rookie Olivia Miles, the Central New Jersey native and second overall pick in April’s draft out of Notre Dame and TCU, scored 24 points to keep Minnesota rolling in first place.

Miles had four 3-pointers as part of a night of overall shooting 9-for-17 from the field with eight assists and six rebounds.

Kayla McBride added 18 points with four makes from deep, part of an overall 56% 14-for-25 from distance by Minnesota.

Playing her first home game and overall, second game of the season after being sidelined since the semifinals recovering from two ankle surgeries in the winter, Napheesa Collier, the defensive player of the year and MVP runner-up, had 15 points, while Natasha Howard scored 13 and substitute Antonia Delaere scored 12, shooting 4-for-5 from beyond the arc.

Toronto’s Marina Marbrey scored 25 with eight boards and six assists, on a team hit with injuries and struggling with four straight losses and eight of nine games. Maria Conde had 20 points and 10 rebounds, while Laura Kuskaite scored 18.

Starting the second quarter down three points, the Lynx then erupted and soared into the half ahead 53-43.

The teams are meeting again in two days in Canada at Toronto.

Clark and Mitchell Keep Fever Win Streak Alive Beating the Storm

Up in the Northwest, Caitlin Clark scored 32 points, and Kelsey Mitchell scored 28 fresh off their All-Star appearance in Chicago, while Aliyah Boston, the third in the Indiana All-Star trio, scored 11, her appearance short-circuited when she took a hard fall in the second quarter and suffered a lower-leg injury but was not ruled out.

Clark was 9-for-14 with four makes from distance, while connecting on all 10 from the line and dealing seven assists.

It’s the ninth time the third-year pro and former rookie of the year has had 30-plus points and five-plus assists, one more than the rest of the entire team it has occurred from others in Fever history.

Mitchell had had a franchise-record 12 straight games of 20 or more points, tied for the third longest in WNBA history.

Indiana has reached 100 points a WNBA-record 12 times this season, helped Tuesday night by Monique Billings with 14 points and 11 boards, while Sophie Cunningham scored 11.

Indiana just missed another WNBA record, shooting a perfect 26 from the line, one-less than the league record for most without a miss.

Seattle lost its seventh straight, wasting Natisha Hiedeman sinking six 3-pointers and reaching a career-high 33 points.

The visitors shot to a 37-20 lead in the first ten minutes and 58-47 at the half.

In the third period, rookie Awa Fam for the Storm made a three to enable the team move within a bucket at 65-63 before Clark exploded scoring 16 of Indiana’s next 18 for a narrow 76-72 lead heading into the final period.

But Mitchell hit a pair of threes at the outset of the fourth and Seattle was unable to mount a challenge the rest of the way.

“My job is always to stay confident and be ready for the next shot and that’s what you guys saw,” Mitchell said of the sequence.

“We had a couple of days off, so I was feeling good coming into this game, and I just wanted to set the tone for the second half of the season,” Billings said.

“No update, it really wasn’t worth the risk in the second half,” Indiana coach Stephanie White said of Boston’s situation after she left the game. “Yeah, our team came together. I think our communication in huddles has been really, really good before we get in there, holding each other down and lifting each other up. We just had to be there for AB and do a little bit more and I think our team did that.”

Wilson Helps Aces Douse Fire

In Las Vegas’ win, reigning and four-time MVP A’ja Wilson off the All-Star events she was involved in scored 28 points with 14 boards shooting 7-for-10 from the field and a near-perfect 13-for-14 from the line, just off the mark of two 30-plus games against Portland earlier this season on the road.

Jackie Young scored 25 points for the Aces on 9-for-14 from the field, while Chelsea Gray scored 17 and reserve Jewell Loys had 11 as the winners shot 58% from the field.

Las Vegas had control by the start of the second quarter leading 36-21.

Portland’s Megan DiLeo scored 20 and helped the Fire move within six at 39-33 in the second quarter but Gray and Young helped complete a 14-4 outburst to finish the half 53-37.

That ended any challenges the rest of the way.

The win gave Las Vegas a 3-0 sweep of Portland for the season despite missing post players NaLyssa Smith and Cheyenne Parker-Tyus.

“Pretty good,” Aces coach Becky Hammon said of her team’s post-break performance. “Except for that third quarter, we gave up too much there, pretty good. God job; everybody is just trying to get into a flow.

“It’s hard to replicate game flow in one day of practice, but it was a good game to kind of get back into our groove a little bit.”

Hammon was pleased with Loyd’s performance off the bench, helping to make up for some of the missing personnel.

“Loyd is a big part of us, and when she gets it going, it relieves a lot of pressure in a lot of ways,” Hammon said. “It gives us bench production, gives us great spacing; she’s always going to do little things to help us win.

“I know that for sure. Bt when she can knock down a couple of threes and be assertive on that end, it definitely helps the group be better overall, and it just puts a lot of pressure on your defense. No coach wants to see — well, I do — Jewell heat it up.”

Of her All-Star snub, Gray said, “It is what it is,” expressing pleasure for Wilson’s and Young’s appearances. “I thought I should have been there.

“I was able to spend extra time with my family and enjoy that. I was happy to do that as well. I love being able to take a break and not even look or talk about basketball. I wasn’t on the phone much. It was nice.”

Stewart and Ionescu Keep Liberty in Win Column Downing Sparks

Breanna Stewart had 29 points and Sabrina Ionescu had two less at 27 as New York kept Los Angeles on the losing side of the game ledger.

New York was down three 56-53 at the half but Stewart had 19 points off 11 of nine field goal attempts in the second++ half along with seven assists, four rebounds and four steals overall.

Ionescu got the visitors off to a 36-30 lead in the first ten minutes scoring 14 points and overall shooting 9-for-16 from the field and sinking five from deep.

Rebekah Gardner added 15 points off the bench where Han Xu and Marine Fautloux each scored 13 points.

The Sparks, now losing six straight and nine of 11, got 24 points from Rae Burrell, while All-Star Nneka Ogwumike had 21 points and nine assists.

Los Angeles in the third period had built an 81-74 lead but New York countered with an 11-4 run ending the period and going up one heading to the final period.

The Liberty were able to be up two positions but not much more from the eight-minute mark until the game’s end.

It was only the third time in the team’s history that in the same game a pair of teammates had 25 points and five assists each. And it’s the second time Stewie and Sab have accomplished the feat.

“We talked about it in the locker room a little bit,” Stewart said. “This is a fresh start. Fresh start second half. We wanted to dictate what really happens on the floor. We were playing the game.

“Taking the shots when they were open. Finding our teammates.”

She added that when defenses are keying on the duo, “there’s a lot open for other teammates.”

“We were getting stops, everyone was flying around getting stops,” Ionesacu said of the visitors’ play in the third period. “We were pushing transition. We got some easy ones. We didn’t want to slow the game down.”

First-year coach Chris DeMarco said of the opposition, “This is a good team that can score. Two teams going at it on offense, you just need enough stops. This was one of those games we were both scoring.

“One of the things we did well was take away the paint in the second half.”

Los Angeles has had all kind of problems with injuries and recently ousting its general manager with two other staffers temporarily sharing the job.

Old Dominion coach DeLisha Milton-Jones had her number retired by Los Angeles.

As for the game, second-year coach Lynne Roberts said, “I think we played well. We had 30 points off of 18 turnovers. We were active, we were connected.

“Good offense beats good defense. Obviously, we’re not going to play perfect. Neither did they. It’s one at a time. I think if we play like this, then we’re going to come out with the right result. We’re repeating ourselves. It’s really frustrating to lose.

“New York’s got some studs on their team, and in those crunch moments, they took over. So, you have to tip your hat to them. They did a great job. But again, I think we can build momentum. We just have to be consistent.”

Second-Year Pros Citron and Iriafen Pace Mystics Over Sun

The two-year All-Star combo of Sonia Citron with 22 points and Kiki Iriafen scored 20 with 10 boards as Washington topped Connecticut to stay solidly inside the loop for playoff qualification.

Shakira Austin added 17 points and six boards as the team’s three game above .500 record is a season best.

Connecticut’s Aneesah Morrow had 21 points while Olivia Nelson-Ododa had 16 points with six boards.

The game was close in the first half and deadlocked at 54 all at the break.

Then Washington came to life with a 25-14 third quarter going up 79-64 heading to the final period.

Off the bench, in 14 minutes, rookie and overall, fourth pick Lauren Betts out of NCAA champion UCLA, had eight points and eight boards just a day after winning the Honda Women’s Cup at CBS in New York Monday night as the top female sports collegian overall competition.

Then Sun have been without Brittney Griner for an extended period and are 1-11 since she’s been out of the lineup.

Looking Ahead

On Wednesday, Atlanta is at Dallas at 8 p.m. on USA, Golden State is at Phoenix at 10 p.m. on CNBC and USA, giving three teams a chance to move forward a bit near the top of the standings.

Thursday will see Minnesota visit Toronto at 8 p.m. on Amazon Prime, which at 10 p.m. airs New York at Las Vegas, holding a two-game win streak over the Aces, though one doesn’t count being the title game in Brooklyn of the Commissioner’s Cup.

Connecticut is at Chicago at 8 p.m. on League Pass.

On Friday, the ION package has Seattle at Atlanta at 7:30 p.m., Dallas at Washington at 7:30 p.m., and Indiana at Portland in Oregon at 10 p.m.

Rounding out the weekend, on Saturday, at 1 p.m., Las Vegas is at Chicago on Paramount+ and CBS, while ABC will air New York at Phoenix at 3 p.m., while on Sunday, Indiana is at Minnesota at 1 p.m. on ABC, Los Angeles is at Portland at 3:30 p.m. on NBC and Peacock, Connecticut is at Dallas at 7 p.m. on Disney+ and ESPN, and Toronto is at Golden State at 8:30 p.m. on League Pass.